


Memories of Trees

by Fairleigh



Category: Original Work
Genre: Forests, Gen, Ghosts, Supernatural Elements, Time Shenanigans, with a twist at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:01:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25713205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fairleigh/pseuds/Fairleigh
Summary: Ghosts are the memories of trees.
Relationships: Kindly Ghost & Child Lost in the Woods
Comments: 5
Kudos: 17
Collections: Original Works Opportunity 2020





	Memories of Trees

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dimthestars](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dimthestars/gifts).



Ghosts are the memories of trees.

Maria is a ghost. She does not know why these woods have summoned her, not at first.

Trees do not remember as humans do. For humans, time is a line, the present drawn straight from the past. For trees, however, time is a ring, the present and the past infinite, symmetrical, both meeting in the middle and encircling everything that has passed beneath their boughs. And their roots reach deep beneath the earth, thick and tangled, an ancient, interwoven network of collective knowledge.

She tries reaching into that vast knowledge, to seek and understand. Her consciousness moves from tree to tree to tree, seeking something — anything — that is not soil, water, or sunlight. Something that is amiss.

Eventually, Maria senses her. A woman? No, a _child_. At present, she is twelve years old. And this child has crossed the boundary into the trees’ domain, and she has left the oft-trodden footpath that will lead her out of the woods again to the safety of her humankind’s pasturelands.

In a trice, Maria appears to drift beside her, phantasmal and weightless as a pollen grain suspended in a spring breeze. Her hair is loose and flowing; her feet and the hems of her skirts do not quite touch the ground.

“You have lost the path, child,” Maria says gently, holding out her hand. “Take my hand and let me help you. I will guide you to where you need to go.”

The child shakes her head at Maria’s hand. She is stubborn, headstrong. She will not accept help, at least not at first … and certainly not from a ghost. “Who were you, and how would you know where I need to go?”

Maria is a ghost, and ghosts are the memories of trees. Trees do not know what humans do when they are not passing underneath the trees’ canopies; therefore, what Maria remembers of her life is limited. “I was a woman of the woods when I was alive,” she says. “I made my home in the branches of the trees; I made my clothes from their leaves; and I made my meals of their fruits, nuts, and berries.” 

“Sound nice,” the child says as she forges a determined path through the underbrush.

“It ought to sound _hard_ ,” Maria admonishes the child. “I had no husband, no family, only myself to rely upon. I was alone with the trees.”

“You were _free_ , and I envy you,” the child says. The pitch of her voice is high and tight with anger. “My brothers tease me; my mother beats me; and my father will want to marry me to a man I don’t love as soon as I am of sufficient age. Yes,” the child continues relentlessly, “I envy you, and I would have your life if I could.”

Maria is silent. The wind blows through the boughs of the trees, and they creak. The leaves rustle like they gossip amongst themselves.

“Very well, you can have the life I had,” Maria says. “Take my hand, Maria, and it will be yours.”

The child’s eyes widen — she had not told the ghost her name, after all — and after only a moment’s hesitation, she obeys.

Ghosts are the memories of trees, and time is ring. She is her past, and she will be her future.


End file.
